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Let me tell you what could have happened. Back in February of 2009, instead of asking the United States Armed forces to take a 10% budget cut, a certain Nobel Prize winner could have said to himself: “Wait a second! After the tsunami that devastated southeast Asia the United States Navy sent hospital ships and aircraft carriers and supplies to aid those regions literally mired in tragedy. During and after the crisis caused by hurricane Katrina it was Navy and Marine Special Ops, Air Force PJ’s, and Coast Guard Air-Sea Rescue Crew who repelled from helicopters to rescue people from rooftops. Marines and Army were on the ground delivering badly needed assistance.”
He would have continued, “I believe I see a new emerging roll for the United States military, one that makes us ambassadors of peace and help. This is more powerful than bullets. It would be foolish for me to ask them to take a cut, because money to the military will get into our economy faster than any stimulus money: Paychecks to soldiers, and money sent to families back home, fabrics bought from American fabric companies, food grown by American farmers, (In order to sell to the United States military companies have to be registered Federal Contractors) helicopters, aircraft, vehicles and heavy equipment built largely built by American contractors. What a great way to beat weapons into ploughshares, and spears into pruning hooks!”
This Nobel prize winner would have taken an educated look at the recent past, and then… then when this horrible earthquake occurred in Haiti, and the United States sent food and generators, and aircraft carriers and hospital boats, it would all have made sense, It would have simply been a part of the vision. But it didn’t happen exactly that way.

I had a little debate with one of the clergy of the Church I attend. I had made a comment back in March of this year that I was very disappointed in the proposed stimulus, the areas where it proposed to spend money, and the fact that our military budget was simultaneously being cut.
He looked at me in response to, “The budget was cut by 10%” and queried me with such a peaceful look of Buddhist wisdom, “And that’s a bad thing?” he asked.

So many people don’t stop and realize, that our military buys massive amounts of equipment and supplies and food and fabric from American companies. It then turns around and helps people in trouble as only the American military can.

Picture for a second what would have been required to help the people either in Haiti or Southeast Asia with the absence of the military apparatus:
Huge ships would have to have been leased from some large shipping company. Helicopters and crew would have to have been leased from experienced organizations, probably like logging companies, then personnel to distribute the assistance would have to have been hired and put in place. The logistics in my simplified version are daunting, probably impossible. Who would have distributed the goods? Who would the Nobel Prize winner have recommended for the task? Acorn? That forever newsworthy community activist group? Well, that may have introduced some problems: Acorn was recently ‘busted’ via hidden camera interviews wherein certain employees of the organization were caught on tape offering advice to people on how to start businesses that were tantamount to brothels, importing underaged girls to ‘do the work’. So any effort to use community activists in Haiti should have to have included some sort of policing organization to make sure that Haitian girls weren’t whisked off by the community activists to be used in brothels somewhere.

There is no organization in the world that can deliver helicopters, generators, personnel, tents, food, medical assistance with the alacrity and logistics of the United States military; don’t even dream of it.
The statement of the clergyman at my parish reminded me of the rant of President Chavez who was verbally flogging the United States for ‘sending soldiers’ to help in Haiti. “Uniten States! Sen help! You not sennning help. You senning soldiers! Don’ sen soldiers Sham on you!”
What an imbecile Chavez is. a clever imbecile, though. Dumb like a Fox. ( I think he sent a twin engine Cessna with a box of galletas as Venezuala’s contribution to the effort)

God bless the U.S. military in their new mission in a turbulent and changing globe. If Al Gore is right about the massive shift towards global warming, then the needed shift for the military towards providing emergency help in a globe battered with storms, tornadoes and hurricanes should have been a given. A democratic Nobel Prize winning president should have had the immediate inside track on that Mission. If the Liberal Vision was consistent, that should have been the natural direction in consideration.

In response to the clergyman with whom I debated, “Yes, cutting the military budget now is a bad thing, and in the mind of anyone who has any sense of vision for the emerging future, it’s very bad thing.”